SPEAKER_00: Thanks for downloading the FBC Elder Rado term podcast.
SPEAKER_00: The term you're about to listen to as part of a series called LivePath.
SPEAKER_00: In this series, we are looking for Christ-centered solutions to everyday problems.
SPEAKER_00: I hope the messages in this series are encouragement to you as you try to follow Christ every day.
SPEAKER_00: Now that the youngest of the kiddos have exited, I have some bad news that I want to share with everyone this morning.
SPEAKER_00: Um summer's almost over.
SPEAKER_00: And I can reflect on this summer and I'm reminded of all the awesome things God has done in our church through events like Vacation Bible School and Camp Haven, our mission trips to Myrtle Beach and Nicaragua.
SPEAKER_00: It has been an amazing summer.
SPEAKER_00: But throughout all those amazing moments during the summer, do you know what?
SPEAKER_00: It's been really hot and humid in El Dorado, hasn't it?
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's been like oppressive to even walk outside on most days.
SPEAKER_00: And so maybe you try to beat the heat in South Arkansas by uh taking uh a dip in the pool or maybe a romp through the sprinkler.
SPEAKER_00: And in my estimation, kind of the perfect summer treat after you get out of the pool or after you've run through the sprinkler is a popsicle.
SPEAKER_00: Specifically, my favorite popsicle is a rocket pop, red, white, and blue.
SPEAKER_00: But listen, moms and dads, you really you need to be aware because if you give your child a popsicle or you eat a popsicle and you're not careful, soon enough that popsicle will melt and you will have this very uh faint sticky glaze over every doorknob and handle and remote control in your home, won't you?
SPEAKER_00: But but what you should think about is doing this.
SPEAKER_00: The next time you pass out popsicles, put them inside of a muffin tin, right?
SPEAKER_00: Because that muffin tin, as the popsicle melts, it's gonna catch all of that sugary sweetness that could then be found throughout your home.
SPEAKER_00: It's gonna prevent the red dye from staining your fingers and then staining the fabric of your couch.
SPEAKER_00: Of course, with some are winding down, that also means that college students are eagerly looking forward to that return to campus.
SPEAKER_00: Now, for college freshmen, let me prepare you for something that's gonna occur when you go to your college dorm room for the very first time.
SPEAKER_00: It's not gonna be as big as your room at mom and dad's house.
SPEAKER_00: And listen, your closet is also going to be smaller, and so you're gonna be thinking, how can I get all of my clothes and all of my shoes and all of my bags and backpacks and everything that I have into this very small closet?
SPEAKER_00: Well, here's an idea for you.
SPEAKER_00: All you need to do is collect the uh the tabs off your favorite uh soft drinks, and then you can link hangers together in a vertical line, and you get more clothes hanging in a single space.
SPEAKER_00: What a great idea.
SPEAKER_00: Now, here's the other thing you're gonna notice when you move into that freshman dormant college.
SPEAKER_00: It's not gonna smell great.
SPEAKER_00: It's gonna smell kind of musty, it's gonna have a really strong odor, but don't worry, don't worry about it.
SPEAKER_00: Go get a box fan at Walmart, and then all you need to do is put a dryer sheet on the back of that box fan, and and the airflow through that box fan, it's gonna keep the dryer sheet attached to it, and it's gonna make your room smell like a fresh load of your favorite uh bath towels.
SPEAKER_00: Who doesn't like that?
SPEAKER_00: Now, listen, it's not gonna eliminate the odor, it just masks the odor.
SPEAKER_00: Or who doesn't love an end-of-the-summer cookout?
SPEAKER_00: Get all your friends together before everybody goes back to school, but you got a problem, your grill is dirty, and the store is out of all your uh favorite cleaning products.
SPEAKER_00: So here's an idea: all you need to do, buy an onion at the store.
SPEAKER_00: They always have plenty of onions, they're never out of onions.
SPEAKER_00: Cut that onion in half, preheat your grill, and then the enzymes on that onion, what it do, what it will do is it will break up the grit and grime on those grill grates.
SPEAKER_00: But there's another problem if you have everybody over uh for an end of the summer cookout.
SPEAKER_00: We have these things called mosquitoes in South Arkansas, don't we?
SPEAKER_00: And sometimes they are as large as helicopters.
SPEAKER_00: And maybe you don't want to buy some of those toxic chemicals.
SPEAKER_00: So, another idea, when you're buying that onion, also get uh four to six limes.
SPEAKER_00: All you gotta do is cut those limes in half and place whole cloves into the flesh of those limes and put them on the table, and it will be a natural repellent against mosquitoes.
SPEAKER_00: Listen, I've never tried that, I just read about it on the internet.
SPEAKER_00: It may or may not work.
SPEAKER_00: I'm actually not that hopeful about the mosquito repellent because mosquitoes are some of the most um diligent insects in all the insect world.
SPEAKER_00: If you've ever met a mosquito, and I know you have.
SPEAKER_00: So each of the solutions I just shared with you is an example of what we call a life hack.
SPEAKER_00: A life hack is simply this it's a creative solution for an everyday problem.
SPEAKER_00: A creative solution for an everyday problem.
SPEAKER_00: The the terminology life hack is a fairly recent innovation, but life hacks have been around for centuries.
SPEAKER_00: Um, your grandmother, listen, you would have a cough or a cold, and your grandmother, she wouldn't go to the pharmacy to get you medicine.
SPEAKER_00: Instead, she'd pull together a few different things out of the cabinet, mix them all together in a jar, whisk it up, and tell you to drink it, and it worked like a charm.
SPEAKER_00: It wasn't approved by the FDA.
SPEAKER_00: That's a life hack.
SPEAKER_00: Or your dad, uh, growing up, you remember as a child, your dad, when he was posed with the problem, all he needed was a roll of duct tape, a hammer, and a little bit of time, and he could figure out how to fix the problem.
SPEAKER_00: Your dad was a life hacker.
SPEAKER_00: People use life hacks like the ones I mentioned to make their life more efficient, to make their life easier, to make their life more productive.
SPEAKER_00: But let's all be honest this morning.
SPEAKER_00: The problems you actually face on a daily basis are much bigger than the trail of sugary glaze that's left by a melting popsicle.
SPEAKER_00: The problems you face on a daily basis, man, they far are far greater than just having a closet that's too small or mosquitoes ruining your party.
SPEAKER_00: Most of the life hacks that you uh read about on the internet or watch on YouTube, they kind of address problems that occur on the very surface of life.
SPEAKER_00: But what you and I know is that the actual problems that we really need to address, they occur at the core of our being.
SPEAKER_00: They they reach far beyond the surface of life.
SPEAKER_00: And those life hacks we read about on the internet or watch on YouTube, they often just give us these uh creative one-step, everything's taken care of answers.
SPEAKER_00: But in our life, the problems that are actually problems, they're far more complex.
SPEAKER_00: They require uh repetition.
SPEAKER_00: They often involve a process if we want to have a solution.
SPEAKER_00: Sure, creative solutions are just fine if the problem you're trying to address is nothing more than really an annoyance or an inconvenience in life.
SPEAKER_00: But if you and I want to address the actual problems of life, we need to get beneath the surface.
SPEAKER_00: We need something other than a creative solution.
SPEAKER_00: We need a Christ-centered solution.
SPEAKER_00: So today we're beginning this series of messages called life hacks as we apply ancient wisdom from God's word to the everyday real problems we face in the modern world.
SPEAKER_00: And as we apply this ancient wisdom to the modern world, to the real problems we face on a daily basis, here's what we hope to uncover some biblical life hacks.
SPEAKER_00: Biblical life hacks, listen, are Christ-centered solutions for everyday problems.
SPEAKER_00: Where we bring Christ to bear on the very real problems that we face.
SPEAKER_00: Some of the problems we're going to talk about over the course of this series, we're going to talk about the problem of time.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I think a lot of us have a problem with time.
SPEAKER_00: Because it never feels like we have enough, and we all struggle to prioritize it.
SPEAKER_00: I think a lot of us have a problem with work.
SPEAKER_00: Either our job isn't fulfilling, or when we go to job, we're just absolutely our job, we're absolutely lazy, or when we uh go to our job, um we just don't enjoy it.
SPEAKER_00: We're we're looking for something else.
SPEAKER_00: And I think all of us we have a problem with worry.
SPEAKER_00: I can't even begin to name all the ways that we worry when we wake up every single morning, and we have a problem with thoughts.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
SPEAKER_00: Often our thoughts dominated by things like uh anger and lust and greed, jealousy.
SPEAKER_00: And the reason we need a biblical life hack, the reason we need a Christ-centered solution for these very real problems, is because only bringing Christ to bear on our life will allow you and I to become the man, the woman that God created us to be.
SPEAKER_00: But I want to give you a warning at the beginning of this series.
SPEAKER_00: So the life hacks that you read on the internet, you watch on YouTube, they promise they can make your life easier.
SPEAKER_00: Now you need to be warned because a Christ-centered solution, a biblical life hack, never promises it will make your life easier.
SPEAKER_00: In fact, some biblical life hacks actually make our life more difficult and more trying.
SPEAKER_00: They actually bring some hardship upon us.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus even tells us in the New Testament we have to count the cost, we have to pick up our cross and follow him.
SPEAKER_00: And also those life hacks that we read about in our culture, they tell us that we're gonna be more efficient and more productive.
SPEAKER_00: Again, not a promise that Jesus makes to us.
SPEAKER_00: Instead, Jesus says, if you'll bring me to bear on your life, here's what I can tell you it's gonna happen.
SPEAKER_00: It's not about uh more efficiency, it's about greater faithfulness, it's not about greater productivity, it's about sanctification, it's about holiness occurring in your life.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, when we apply and bring Christ to bear on the problems we face every single day, these very real problems, we become like Him.
SPEAKER_00: So, in week one, I thought we should talk about what I believe to be the biggest problem that each of us face on a daily basis.
SPEAKER_00: And listen, our biggest problem isn't somewhere out there, it's not someone else, it's not something going on in our world or something going on in our nation.
SPEAKER_00: It's not even what someone would do to us, our biggest problem every day, not someone out somewhere out there, it's it's in here.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
SPEAKER_00: Our biggest problem on a daily basis that we need to apply this Christ-centered solution to is the human heart.
SPEAKER_00: We need to hack the human heart.
SPEAKER_00: So, first, let's identify and ask the question what's the problem?
SPEAKER_00: What's the problem?
SPEAKER_00: That's the whole reason you need a hack, right?
SPEAKER_00: Is you have to know the problem.
SPEAKER_00: There has to be a problem that exists.
SPEAKER_00: The prophet Jeremiah uh describes the problem with the human heart this way, Jeremiah chapter 17, verse 9.
SPEAKER_00: He says, the human heart is the most deceitful of all things and desperately wicked.
SPEAKER_00: Who really knows how bad it is?
SPEAKER_00: With that single verse, Jeremiah highlights one of the most prevalent themes found throughout Scripture: the centrality of the human heart.
SPEAKER_00: Biblical authors uh they mention the human heart right around a thousand times.
SPEAKER_00: Occasionally, when the biblical writer mentions the heart, that author is speaking about that four-chambered uh blood-pumping muscle in the human chest.
SPEAKER_00: There's a story in 1 Samuel chapter 25 about a man named Nabal.
SPEAKER_00: And Nabal receives some uh unfortunate news.
SPEAKER_00: He receives a report, and the author of 1 Samuel tells us that Nabal in that moment, his heart fails and he becomes like a stone in that moment.
SPEAKER_00: It sounds like based upon what Nabal hears, he suffers a massive heart attack.
SPEAKER_00: Like his physical heart gives out.
SPEAKER_00: And occasionally the biblical authors are talking about that physical heart.
SPEAKER_00: But more often, um, the biblical writer, when they mention the human heart, it's a metaphor.
SPEAKER_00: It's a catch-all term that includes your mind, your emotions, your spirit, and your will.
SPEAKER_00: Your heart, then, according to the writers of scripture, is the control center of your person.
SPEAKER_00: Out of your heart issue forth every thought that you have, every desire, every emotion, every behavior, every habit, every purpose you feel in life, every motivation you follow in life, all of that comes out of the heart.
SPEAKER_00: Or the writer Dallas Willard describes the heart this way.
SPEAKER_00: Listen to what he says.
SPEAKER_00: I love this summary statement.
SPEAKER_00: He says, the function of the heart is to organize life as a whole.
SPEAKER_00: And indeed, to organize it around God.
SPEAKER_00: A great part of the disaster of contemporary life lies in the fact that it is organized.
SPEAKER_00: That's the heart.
SPEAKER_00: It is organized around feelings.
SPEAKER_00: Think about that.
SPEAKER_00: We organize our thoughts, our emotions, our desires, our habits, everything that issues forth out of us, that's our heart.
SPEAKER_00: We organize it around our feelings.
SPEAKER_00: How something will make me feel later on, how something will make me feel in the moment, how something may make someone else feel as a result of that action, we organize our heart around feelings.
SPEAKER_00: And that gets us in trouble.
SPEAKER_00: That gets us in a lot of trouble, doesn't it?
SPEAKER_00: Because as Jeremiah says, this heart where our feelings come out of, this heart is what?
SPEAKER_00: Most deceitful.
SPEAKER_00: Think about that phrase, most deceitful.
SPEAKER_00: The heart, in essence, tells us lie after lie after lie after lie after lie.
SPEAKER_00: The heart tells us little white lies and big bold lies.
SPEAKER_00: You probably noticed that in um recent election cycles, after a candidate gives a speech, or after candidates debate one another, that the news coverage always has someone on their panel who is called a fact checker.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: A fact checker, someone who takes what the person, the candidate said, and compares what they said to what we know to actually be true.
SPEAKER_00: And across both sides of the aisle, what appears to happen is that most of the time, what is true and what is a lie, it's basically 50-50.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: A lot of lies are told, and we're supposed to believe that they are true.
SPEAKER_00: Now, of course, those you know, politicians, maybe they don't know that they're lying.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know.
SPEAKER_00: Or maybe they do, I don't know either.
SPEAKER_00: But here's the thing at some level, maybe they tell a lie to get elected, but at another level, the reason that they lie is because their heart's like, my heart.
SPEAKER_00: It's most deceitful.
SPEAKER_00: So they need a fact checker.
SPEAKER_00: And just like that man or woman needs a fact checker, you and I, we need a fact checker.
SPEAKER_00: Your heart needs the truth of scripture to fact check the lies that it tells itself.
SPEAKER_00: I want to point out, I think just a series of lies, I think we often tell ourselves that the human heart speaks.
SPEAKER_00: Lie number one.
SPEAKER_00: If everybody's doing it, it must be okay.
SPEAKER_00: The heart tells us that lie because the heart wants us to kind of make our home within a culture.
SPEAKER_00: Our heart wants us to find comfort in the culture and not to stand opposed to the culture and stand apart from the culture.
SPEAKER_00: The heart wants a hassle-free life.
SPEAKER_00: So if everybody's doing it, it's gotta be okay.
SPEAKER_00: Yet when you fact-check that statement with God's word, we're reminded 1 Peter chapter 2, verse 9, you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God's special possession.
SPEAKER_00: Over and over, 1 Peter chapter 2, verse 9 just makes it clear, you are different than the world, than the culture that surrounds you.
SPEAKER_00: Another lie I think we hear from the heart is just the lie, I've got this, I've got this.
SPEAKER_00: Here's the thing: I think we really like to live compartmentalized lives because that's how uh we try to make life manageable.
SPEAKER_00: And maybe we make life into two kind of big compartments.
SPEAKER_00: Stuff that I can manage on my own and I don't need God's help with.
SPEAKER_00: And that could be work, that could be your family, that could be your friends, that could be your finances, like anything where you feel competency, you're like, God, I got this.
SPEAKER_00: And you only allow God into those pieces and parts of your life where you feel a little incompetent, and you're you're pretty um reluctant to admit that incompetence.
SPEAKER_00: So you let God into your life if you come on a Sunday morning, right?
SPEAKER_00: Because, well, you're with God's people in God's house, like, I'll let you in, God.
SPEAKER_00: Or you let God into your life when maybe a tragedy occurs, or you let God into your life when um you have a big decision that you need to make.
SPEAKER_00: But if those things don't occur, if life is just kind of bouncing along, beboping along, and everything's going well, you just say, I've got this.
SPEAKER_00: I'm good.
SPEAKER_00: We tell ourselves that lie, and then scripture says this.
SPEAKER_00: Unless the Lord builds the house, the builders labor in vain.
SPEAKER_00: Unless the Lord watches over the city, the guards stand watch in vain.
SPEAKER_00: Psalm 127, verse 1 just says, You don't got it.
SPEAKER_00: No matter how competent you feel, builders know how to build, and guards know how to stand watch.
SPEAKER_00: That's their training.
SPEAKER_00: But unless God's a part of it, unless God's invited in, it's all in vain.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe another lie would just be this one.
SPEAKER_00: No one will ever know.
SPEAKER_00: That's the lie the heart speaks when we're on the threshold of sin, isn't it?
SPEAKER_00: No one's ever gonna see, no one's ever gonna know.
SPEAKER_00: No one's in this room with me.
SPEAKER_00: No one's watching over my shoulder.
SPEAKER_00: But God knows.
SPEAKER_00: Psalm 139, verse 1, no one, um Psalm 139 says, You have searched me, Lord, and you know me.
SPEAKER_00: God knows.
SPEAKER_00: And also I'd say I would say this: um, your family will know.
SPEAKER_00: Your friends will know.
SPEAKER_00: They may never be able to name a specific sin or a specific kind of destructive habit in your life, but they will see your character change and they will experience the consequence of that character change.
SPEAKER_00: They will know.
SPEAKER_00: You can't hide it.
SPEAKER_00: Another lie we say is I can have it all.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
SPEAKER_00: I can have it all, I can do it all, I can experience it all, I can say yes to everything.
SPEAKER_00: I'll have to give up nothing.
SPEAKER_00: Yet Jesus says in Matthew chapter 10, verse 39, whoever finds their life will lose it, and whoever loses their life for my sake will find it.
SPEAKER_00: You can't have it all, guys.
SPEAKER_00: You gotta lose something.
SPEAKER_00: And there may be a lie that you say to yourself, you hear is nobody loves me.
SPEAKER_00: Man, we live in a culture that denigrates the worth of people.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: We live in a culture that says love is earned.
SPEAKER_00: We live in a culture that doesn't have the perspective of God when it comes to everyone in this room and everyone in our community that people are created and loved by God.
SPEAKER_00: And when we hear that lie over and over, it causes us to isolate ourselves.
SPEAKER_00: It causes us to doubt ourselves, it causes us to feel like we are unworthy, we are unlovable.
SPEAKER_00: We believe like there is something like innately wrong with us in the sense of like, I'm not worthy to have friends, I'm not worthy to have a family, I'm not worthy to know a God who loves me when we hear that lie, nobody loves me.
SPEAKER_00: But scripture says that God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son.
SPEAKER_00: You are created and loved by God.
SPEAKER_00: Those are just five of the lies that I think the human heart often speaks.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe one of those just resonated really deeply with you.
SPEAKER_00: Or you have may have your own lie that you want to add to that list.
SPEAKER_00: And what happens in our heart is if we just leave those lies unattended, the wickedness grows.
SPEAKER_00: Because that lie, what it does is it produces a hardness of heart.
SPEAKER_00: Can you see the presence of this problem in your everyday life when it comes to the lies spoken by the human heart?
SPEAKER_00: Just think about your actions and your reactions and your habits and your attitudes.
SPEAKER_00: Do they reflect the lies of the heart or the fact-checking truth of God's word?
SPEAKER_00: And it's my assumption that all of us are dealing with this problem.
SPEAKER_00: I know all of us are dealing with this problem on varying levels.
SPEAKER_00: No one's immune to it.
SPEAKER_00: Which means that all of us, we need to seek out this Christ-centered solution together.
SPEAKER_00: And we find that solution in the words of another prophet in the Old Testament, this time the prophet Ezekiel.
SPEAKER_00: God speaks these words to the prophet Ezekiel.
SPEAKER_00: Ezekiel 36, verse 26.
SPEAKER_00: And I will give you a new heart, and I will put a new spirit in you.
SPEAKER_00: I will take out your stony, stubborn heart, and give you a tender, responsive heart.
SPEAKER_00: In December of 1967, a man named Lewis lay on an operating table in Cape Town, South Africa.
SPEAKER_00: Lewis was only 53 years old, but he was suffering the effects of chronic heart disease.
SPEAKER_00: His doctors had tried every treatment, and the only treatment that was left available to Lewis was a revolutionary new treatment never successfully before performed on a human, the heart transplant.
SPEAKER_00: Dr.
SPEAKER_00: Christian Bernard was the doctor who was tasked to perform that heart transplant on Lewis.
SPEAKER_00: And with great precision, the doctor removed that ailing, failing heart and gave Lewis, lying on that table, a new heart.
SPEAKER_00: The promise and the potential of modern medicine had reached a new standard.
SPEAKER_00: Something had been fulfilled that had been dreamed of and talked about and believed possible.
SPEAKER_00: Yet thousands of years before, a far greater promise was fulfilled.
SPEAKER_00: Through the life and the death and the resurrection of Jesus Christ, God gives us a new heart.
SPEAKER_00: In effect, Jesus looks at Nicodemus and says, Nicodemus, your heart is ailing and failing.
SPEAKER_00: You must be born again.
SPEAKER_00: You need a new heart.
SPEAKER_00: And you can only have that new heart when you place your faith in Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: When you receive that free gift of salvation.
SPEAKER_00: Listen, your old heart lies to you.
SPEAKER_00: But a new heart given to you by Jesus can tell the truth.
SPEAKER_00: Because now Jesus Christ, Ephesians 3, verse 17 tells us, Jesus Christ dwells in your heart by faith.
SPEAKER_00: And that's the Christ-centered solution some of us need to apply today.
SPEAKER_00: We need to put our faith in Jesus Christ for the very first time and to be born again and to receive a new heart.
SPEAKER_00: A heart that Ezekiel says is tender and responsive.
SPEAKER_00: A heart that's tender and responsive.
SPEAKER_00: Think about those two words, tender and responsive.
SPEAKER_00: Ezekiel is describing a heart that is first aware of God's presence.
SPEAKER_00: Ezekiel then describes a heart that obeys God's direction.
SPEAKER_00: And I think those two words, tender, responsive, describe the second way that we can apply a Christ-centered solution to the human heart.
SPEAKER_00: So many of us in this room, we have placed our faith in Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: We've received that free gift of salvation.
SPEAKER_00: But we're like a physical heart transplant.
SPEAKER_00: There's some rejection going on in our body.
SPEAKER_00: Instead of tender, our heart, it just seems it's cold to the presence of God.
SPEAKER_00: Instead of responsive, our heart ignores the direction of God.
SPEAKER_00: And that's why we continue to listen to some of those old lies.
SPEAKER_00: If the Christ-centered option then is a tender, responsive heart, how do we nurture that?
SPEAKER_00: How do we develop and cultivate that tender, responsive heart in our lives?
SPEAKER_00: So there's this practice that's been a habit of Christians for centuries, and it's called the daily exam.
SPEAKER_00: Or maybe they call it the daily review.
SPEAKER_00: It's a prayer that happens at the end of the day when a person says, God, help me see the places where you were with me, and help me to know myself.
SPEAKER_00: Help me to see my heart.
SPEAKER_00: The first part of the prayer is the examine of consciousness.
SPEAKER_00: During that part of the prayer, what a person does is they just take a few moments and they ask God to pinpoint all the ways where God was present throughout the course of the last 24 hours.
SPEAKER_00: Where was God present?
SPEAKER_00: Where was God leading?
SPEAKER_00: And at the end of the day, God pinpoints those moments and makes you aware of those times.
SPEAKER_00: And what's the goal in that moment?
SPEAKER_00: To give you a tender heart.
SPEAKER_00: A heart that's aware over those 24 hours of every day where God is at work and where God is leading and where God is present and where God is active.
SPEAKER_00: And the second part of the prayer is an examine of conscience, where, again, at the end of the day, we just say, God, replay this last 24 hours for me.
SPEAKER_00: And God, as you replay those last 24 hours, will you put a spotlight on those moments when my mind, when my attitude, when my action, when my heart didn't exhibit the character of Christ?
SPEAKER_00: When my heart didn't demonstrate the fruit of the Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: A heart that says yes to God.
SPEAKER_00: That can be hard.
SPEAKER_00: Because when you ask God to highlight those moments, here's what you can't do.
SPEAKER_00: You can't defend and you can't rationalize.
SPEAKER_00: You can't mitigate and say, oh, it wasn't that bad.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe it really was.
SPEAKER_00: Since the human heart is our biggest problem, I want us to take now just a few moments and to practice this prayer of examine.
SPEAKER_00: So I want you to find a posture of prayer, okay?
SPEAKER_00: I want you to close your eyes and bow your head.
SPEAKER_00: We're going to do a prayer of examine right now.
SPEAKER_00: But I would invite you and encourage you to do it tonight before you go to bed.
SPEAKER_00: Do it tomorrow night before you go to bed.
SPEAKER_00: Do it the next night before you go to bed.
SPEAKER_00: Build it into your habit of your daily life and just spin now and invite God to go with you and say, God, in the last 24 hours, show me where you've been present and help me to see my life for what it is, and to be have a true self-knowledge of myself.
SPEAKER_00: Invite God in to help you see.
SPEAKER_00: Show me, God, where you were leading and I was unaware.
SPEAKER_00: Make me tender to your presence.
SPEAKER_00: Ask God now to give you a true knowledge of yourself.
SPEAKER_00: Before a word is on my tongue, Lord, you know it completely.
SPEAKER_00: God, show me the attitudes and the actions and the moments when I did not exhibit the character of Christ.
SPEAKER_00: When I did not demonstrate the fruit of the Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: Give me a responsive heart.
SPEAKER_00: And now confess where over the last twenty-four hours you fell short, those places God revealed to you.
SPEAKER_00: Confess and ask for forgiveness.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Would y'all look at me?
SPEAKER_00: So remember what we said at the beginning of the service was that the life hacks that our culture offers us, they are life hacks that are one-time answers.
SPEAKER_00: They're simple, they're straightforward, but often these biblical life hacks that are Christ-centered solutions, it's a process.
SPEAKER_00: It requires repetition.
SPEAKER_00: It's a habit we have to build into our life.
SPEAKER_00: And this life hack, listen, this biblical life hack, the prayer of examine, it's not a self-help technique.
SPEAKER_00: It's not what it is.
SPEAKER_00: It's not self-help because we're inviting God into our lives.
SPEAKER_00: Because only God address the problem that ails the human heart.
SPEAKER_00: To invite God into that space day by day, moment by moment, hour by hour, trusting that He and He alone can give you a new heart.
SPEAKER_00: A heart that is what?
SPEAKER_00: Hear those words again, tender and responsive.
SPEAKER_00: Tender and responsive.
SPEAKER_00: But again, there are those who are here this morning that need a new heart.
SPEAKER_00: Your heart, as described by Jeremiah, is ailing and failing.
SPEAKER_00: You must be born again.
SPEAKER_00: And my invitation to you this morning is: will you put your faith in Jesus Christ?
SPEAKER_00: Will you trust Him to be Lord and Savior of your life?
SPEAKER_00: Let's stand together.
SPEAKER_00: Father, we thank you for the truth of your word and the ways you have spoken to us today.
SPEAKER_00: Make our hearts tender and responsive to you.
SPEAKER_00: And give boldness to those who need to put their faith today in Jesus Christ, that they would come forward and we can share with them the good news of the gospel.